“It is simply this: do not tire, never lose interest, never grow indifferent—lose your invaluable curiosity and you let yourself die. It’s as simple as that.”
“I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little farther down our particular path than we have yet got ourselves.”
E. M. Forster (1879-1970) English novelist, essayist, critic, librettist
Iâm laughing, but thereâs a super useful corollary, which my husband calls âthe Red Balloon.â He was a defense lawyer and had a fair number of drug addicts come through, and there is a thing where if youâre like, on your first offense, theyâll do a thing where you can go to treatment and if you complete it theyâll take the conviction off your record.Â
And he would tell his clients, âLook, everyoneâs going to tell you not to do drugs. Theyâre going to say it over and over again. And itâs like, if people tell you not to think of a white elephant, youâre going to think of a white elephant. But the trick to not thinking about a white elephant is to think of a red balloon. So you need to find your red balloon. For some people itâs yoga. For others itâs woodworking. For some people itâs scrapbooking or gardening or any of a long list of things to do. They focus on that, itâs a lot easier to succeed in ignoring the white elephant.â
So yeah, âwatch yourselfâ is one thing⊠but the better idea is to watch something else. (Even if itâs fanfic about werewolves fucking.)
Itâs a form of productive dissociation, and is super, super helpful.
Itâs easy for me to get bogged down in how much pain Iâm in⊠but some of the most painful periods of my life have also been the most productive, writing-wise, because writing is one of my red balloons.Â
There is a phrase I use A LOT in my parenting and my son gets very sick of it, but itâs true:
The thing you practise is the thing you get good at.
You may not intentionally be practicing âbeing grumpyâ but if you donât put effort into practicing ânot being grumpyâ then Iâm afraid thatâs what youâre doing. Itâs hard! Itâs really hard! Sometimes, for some things, itâs pretty much impossible and that sucks!
But being carefully aware that you are going to get good at the things you do most of is a good way to be more careful of what those things are. If that makes sense.
You gotta appreciate sometimes how tumblr works in such a way that everyone who wants to reblog this interesting or useful psychological advice is also forced to reblog the thing about werewolf fucking
lifehack: when you see a Take One candy bowl in a restaurant, wait until noones looking and shovel candy into your pockets. god may judge you but his sins outnumber your own
âGod may judge you but his sins outnumber your own.â We really need to start collecting and sourcing these Potent Quotables.
âȘ90s babies how do we feel about entering our 30s in this new decade?âŹ
90s babies, I know 30 sounds scary, but from this late 80s baby itâs fucking great. I just donât give a fuck anymore about all this shit that used to terrify me and weigh me down in my twenties. I got the confidence to start dating women and living my truth when I turned 30. I feel like Iâm becoming the realest version of myself. Embrace the transformation. Your life isnât ending. Quite the opposite.
my singing voice is good for showers and mornings in the kitchen and drunken nights and lullabies for babies who need sleep and im okay with this
i think itâs silly to be ashamed of your art because itâs not in a museum and of your voice because itâs not selling out stadiums. there will always be people who enjoy and appreciate what you can do.
Idk why but this hit me really hard and Iâve been staring at it for a couple minutes.
This is fucking sick. Fuck capitalism and fuck private healthcare. This system is so disgusting. Vote for Bernie Sanders we need Medicare for All.Â
[Video transcript start: âAlright, yâall like the desk shit, and Iâve got plenty of it. So hereâs another scenario: you go to the emergency room, you get a bill for a thousand dollars. The very first thing you do, other than calling and asking for a âreview of the level of care,â thatâs the first thing you do. While on the phone, while theyâre doing that, you also say, âI want an itemized bill with every single charge.â
âNow what theyâre going to do on the back end of thatâbecause they donât want you to know that theyâve charged you thirty-seven dollars for a fucking band-aidâtheyâre going to take that thirty-seven dollar charge right off of there. Before they send you the itemized statement, any of those stupid charges? Theyâre gonna take them right off. Generally, my bills go from a thousand dollars to seven-hundred and fifty, they take about two-hundred dollars off just for stupid shit. All you have to do is ask for an itemized bill with every charge, and theyâre gonna take those charges off, âcause they donât want you to know that theyâre charging you thirty-seven dollars for a fucking band-aid, and guess what? Thatâs how much they charge for a fucking band-aid. So, when you actually can say, âYou charged me thirty-seven dollars for a band-aid?â They donât like that. So they remove-â Audio cuts off mid-sentence and ends.]
Wish I would have known this when I had to go to the hospital a couple years ago. Over 500 dollar bill for a band aid & antibiotic cream that I put on myself đ
Dont let them screw you.
You can also write a Letter of Hardship if youâre in financial distress and theyâll reduce the bill drastically. I had a $2.5K ER bill, wrote to the billing department saying Iâm unmarried, unemployed, and uninsured, and they knocked it down to $125.
